


Compression

by PUNK_MENACE



Category: Titans (TV 2018)
Genre: Anxiety, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Caretaking, Claustrophobia, Explosions, F/M, Family Feels, Hurt/Comfort, Hyperventilating, Injury, Introspection, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Paranoia, Physical hurt/comfort, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred, Team as Family, Trapped, Worry, gar is too mature, headache, hurt!Dick, so is rachel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-26
Updated: 2019-07-26
Packaged: 2020-07-20 03:14:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19985155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PUNK_MENACE/pseuds/PUNK_MENACE
Summary: A run-in with the Nuclear Family leaves Dick in a tight space.  Literally.Spending hours under rubble, barely able to breathe to the point of delirium, doesn't exactly do wonders for his mental stability.





	Compression

**Author's Note:**

> This was a request from Tumblr that I took a good while to write for various reasons. I sort of hate how it came out only because I wasn't able to write it all at once - writer's block hit hard due to real-life troubles. But it's done so pls just take it off my hands lol. On a happier note, I love family feels and making Dick almost lose his mind.  
> Heres the exact prompt:  
> "Can I prompt a story in which Dick would be hurt, and then saved and getting care from team (Titans). Some angst/whump like he's been captured/kidnapping and tortured, or closed/buried alive, and then getting broken and claustrophobic. In tv series Dick was their leader and tried to watch over the team, but this time he would be person who need to be rescued. With his POV and PTSD after. Scared and broken Dick, and a team who saving and cares about him. Some angst, but with happy ending"  
> Hope you enjoy buckaroo

Being stuck in a small, confined space does things to your mind. To be stuck and heavily injured makes it hard to breathe. Less oxygen, rising panic, absolutely no space to move at all or stretch, it all adds up. But the worst part for him is not knowing if everyone else is okay.

It began by being chased by the evil version of the Brady Bunch. 

In a highly populated city, there are pros and cons regarding being hunted. The upside of the bustling city that Dick, Kori, Gar, and Rachel find themselves in is that people on the street don’t mind the odd things that happen around them. They all have a purpose to fulfill and it doesn’t matter if it’s getting diapers and milk or something more sinister – every pedestrian turns a blind eye to the oddly perfect family sprinting after the mismatched little family that Dick will protect at all costs. It sounds negative but it’s better to leave civilians out of a fight, especially with super-powered people like the “family” that has found them again.

The downside is how incredibly difficult it is to get through the crowds without losing everyone. There’s also the problem of getting past the many buildings and not ending up at a dead end. Dick doesn’t know the layout of this city and every turn could be mean forcing them into a fight he isn’t willing to start. 

As the four of them run full-tilt down the sidewalk, ramming shoulders and spilling many coffees, Dick is glad for the grueling training Bruce put him through. Without it, he’d have run out of breath five miles back. 

“Dick!” Rachel, Gar, and Kori aren’t faring as well as he is. “I can’t go much farther,” Rachel yells between gasping breaths. 

He knows this. What he doesn’t know is how to get out of this situation. In a split-second decision, Dick decides to trust his gut. “That building,” he pants, “It’s abandoned. We get in there, we have cover, and we can either lose them or fight properly.” His chest burns in a familiar way. Pushing the sensation away, Dick slows down so that he’s behind everyone.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” Kori shouts at him. She’s narrowing her eyes at him in a distinctly knowing way. Dick grins at her, proud that he doesn’t have a reckless idea this time. But he _does_ know that if it comes down to it, Rachel, Gar, and Kori are his priority. Not his own wellbeing, theirs. They deserve better than him but this isn’t the time to drown in his self-loathing. If he has to suffer for their sake then it’s just right; after all, Dick hasn’t been the most reliable person. 

The building, a large and dilapidated structure, provides plenty of cover among the rotting palettes of crates. The boxes probably hold products that were never liquidated and simply left here after a failed business. Either way, it doesn’t matter, all that matters is hiding his kids in the safest corners and making sure Kori doesn’t carry out any selfless plan, either. 

They tuck Rachel into a corner and make them promise her not to move. Then, they find a place nearby to keep Gar safe and do the same. “Stay here and don’t move,” she tells Gar. He nods hesitantly. “Promise us, Gar!” She doesn’t quite shout, but her tone is passionate enough to convey her urgency. 

“I…I promise. I promise.” Gar nods, curling like a cat deeper into the gap between two crates. “Wait,” his hand shoots out and grabs Dick’s, “Please come back. In one piece.”

Dick promises him because he owes them all at least this, and from there, things only go downhill. Though he and Kori find their own hiding places within reach of both Rachel and Gar, only Kori is spotted. It wasn’t anything specific, like a stray hair strand or glint of green eyes, merely a stroke of bad luck.

But Dick won’t let anything or anyone take his family away from him, not again. So he tackles the Mom – this time she sports black eyes and hair – and lets his worse half take over. Rage and violence are so easy to turn to these days and even more so when he sees that the mother ripped a chunk of Kori’s hair out. He lets the sickening satisfaction wash over him when his fists rain down so steadily and brutally that he hears a distinct crunch.

But their bad luck doesn’t end there. With Mom down for the count and Kori grappling with the Son and Daughter, Dick switches his focus onto the Dad. While Dick is beating the father, who decided now was a good time to get his entire face rearranged, the two kids split off. Dick’s vision has tunneled at this point. He can’t stop his fist’s path to the father’s face over and over and over again. His mind has virtually shut down. So he doesn’t see the kids strapping full-fledged explosives on the worn stone supports.

A few seconds later it’s impossible to miss the explosions obliterating the columns. He can’t take any chances right now. Dick whips a knife out of the back of his belt and slams it into the father’s shoulder. With him properly dealt with, the Mom tries to repay him and tackles him onto the cold stone floor. His head smacks into the stone but his body is full of adrenaline and the dizziness isn’t enough to stop him. Dick flips the mother onto the floor and keeps her down by the neck. “Kori!” She nods, already knowing what to do. Rachel and Gar are their priority. She’ll take them out of the warehouse. And it’ll just have to be without him.

Dick increases the pressure on the mother’s neck and slams her into the floor for good measure. The supports finally crack completely and the whole room is rapidly filled with dust. He doesn’t see much after that.

* * *

The first thing Dick can register when he wakes up is that he can’t breathe. Physically, he can’t make his chest expand very far, making his breathing painfully shallow. Next, he realizes that he can’t move any part of his body. And from there, only pain comes. It’s cold and muted as if he’s been bathed in ice after being beaten within an inch of his life, and it makes his back arch within the confines of wherever he is.

Without the proper air, Dick can’t even groan. He can whimper, yes, and the dust falling around him into his hair and eyes and mouth makes him cough pathetically. His body jerks with the short coughs, barely enough to clear his airways. Dick blinks rapidly to try and adjust to the darkness but all he can see are stars. Suddenly, Dick vividly remembers the entire abandoned warehouse crumbling around him as he shouted for Kori to get the kids out. With the roof literally falling on their heads, the deranged family had still tried to fight against Dick, or at least what was still left of them. It only made sense that he stay behind to keep them back.

The problem is that he’s been buried alive and there’s no one that knows exactly where he is or if he’s still alive. He’s injured, who knows how badly, and there isn’t enough oxygen to last him long. With the space around him so tight, he supposes about an hour or two at most. 

Dick blinks again, heart beating uncomfortably fast against his aching rib cage. He can’t take a full breath. It feels like he can’t breathe, _period_. But he doesn’t know if Kori, Gar, and Rachel are okay and the thought of them being trapped is infinitely more painful than his situation.

Anxiety crawls up his spine, turning into a venomous panic with each stunted breath he takes. There’s nothing he can do. Of all the sidekicks, he had been the most useless. A human among demigods and speedsters and it hasn’t changed now that he’s older. He’s just a washed-up, violent failure with human limitations and no way to move the tons of stone threatening to crush him.

He can’t do anything.

And now, he can’t even breathe properly. Of course, he’s been trained for this situation. Breathing techniques were drilled into his impressionable brain as soon as Bruce started training him. The assurance that other heroes and sidekicks have better things to do than rescue him and, above that, the fact that he should be capable of wiggling out of anywhere came next. Being Batman’s sidekick simply meant that Dick had to fight to be stronger than his human limitations. Even if it meant ripping himself to shreds for the sake of a mission. Now he’s lying in the most uncomfortable position he can imagine and he can’t fucking breathe.

_Twelve seconds: four seconds to inhale, four more to hold, and four to exhale. One, two-_

He gets as far as two seconds before his rhythm shatters and he’s back to hyperventilating. There is nothing to do but wait and think of his own failures.

About an hour later, his headache is raging against his skull and the static numbness all over his body has begun to feel like ice-cold needles digging into his nerves. He needs a reprieve, he needs to move and breathe deeply, he _needs_ to get out of here. 

“Get me the _fuck_ out of here!” Dick shrieks. He would be pounding his fists against the stone encasing him, damned the consequences, if he could move that much. Even just a bit of space would help so that he could shift and adjust. His blood hasn’t been flowing properly for a while now. A scream has been building right in the middle of his chest and now that he’s let go of all reservations, it bursts from his jaws. It’s painfully loud when it breaks the thick silence and only serves to heighten his hysteria. He screams again, this time tapering off in a fit of pathetic sobs. “Fuck!”

All of the nervous energy drained out of him suddenly. It leaves him feeling deflated and empty. The silence renews, twice as strong this time, and he hiccups and lets out a few more grating sobs. And then he stops. Abruptly, he swallows back any pitiful noises threatening to bubble up in an attempt to listen.

When he finally hears it again, Dick starts to laugh. It starts as a simple exhale but quickly escalated until he’s heaving with cackles as much as physically possible in the tiny space he has. They’re unnerving even to Dick but he can’t stop now that he’s started. 

It was Rachel’s voice calling out to him. But more than that, it’s fucking salvation. It’s the sweet, sweet noise of his ward followed by Kori and Gar’s faint yells that fills him with overwhelming, mind-boggling relief.

Another fifteen minutes later and the first streaks of light send knives through his skull but he blinks rapidly and adjusts. It was only a couple minutes earlier that the air started to run out but in those short two minutes, he’d had time to think about the prospect of dying just seconds before getting dug out. Instead, he’s able to gulp down huge breaths of blessed, sweet, open air. Soon after his sad excuse of a cave had been breached, Dick is pulled out of the rubble and straight into Kori’s awaiting arms.

He’s had time to think about a future without them. In those two hours, his mind had wandered from one possibility to the next, including him dying in putrid silence and the others being left to wonder if he was alive. Dick doesn’t hold himself back – he wouldn’t be able to if he wanted, mentally and physically, he’s incapable of rational thought at the moment. He just collapses against Kori and devolves into a puddle of gasping, wet coughs and shuddering breaths, letting out a weak curse or sob ever so often. Kori shushes him and lowers him down on a flat piece of concrete where Rachel and Gar kneel on either side and attach themselves to him. 

Unfortunately, now that his blood has started moving around his extremities again, Dick’s entire body seems to flip a switch and in the blink of an eye, he’s too weak to stay upright. Pain explodes through his limbs and torso and amplifies his now-apocalyptic headache. He slips out of Kori’s arms and lands with a thud on the concrete next to her. 

The worst of the pain is on his shoulder and his thigh. The numbness is replaced by the horrible sensation of ants crawling over his body and his back arches involuntarily. Kori gathers him up in her arms again and leans his head against her shoulder, her voice vibrating through her chest but absolutely no words registering in Dick’s mind. The pain spikes, making Dick go stiff in Kori’s hold as he struggles not to scream again. A fresh round of tears slide down his face and trickle past his ears. Kori tightens and shifts her grip around him, says something else punctuated by something that vaguely sounds like his name, and scoops him off the floor bridal-style.

The movement is nauseating. He swallows back the contents of his stomach and lets his head hang back, breathing unevenly and face screwed up in agony. Kori’s pace is quick and her strides are long. He doesn’t know where she’s taking him but it must be somewhere nice. She murmurs something to him and this time he can sort of make something out.

All he can hear is, “…take care of you…idiot…”

Dick’s hand slips from his stomach, hanging down limply. A small hand wraps around his own, warm and familiar. Keeping himself mostly sane for two hours took a lot of mental effort and he can feel blood soaking the skin and cloth around his shoulder and thigh. Exhaustion begins to drown him like the tide coming in, taking his hearing and sight and coherency and finally his consciousness.

* * *

“We’re not going to a hospital, right, Kori?” Rachel asks. She would probably be wringing her hands if she weren’t holding on tight to Dick’s hand with her right and Gar’s hand with her left. Tears hover on the edge of her eyelashes but she’s been incredibly strong.

And so has Gar. “I a-also don’t think that’s a good idea,” he says. His free hand is worrying at his hoodie string.

“I know,” Kori says, “We’ll have to patch him up on our own. We’ll find a motel that won’t look twice and take care of him, alright?”

“I can help! I know how to do sutures,” Gar offers, looking a bit unraveled. “Chief taught all of us how to since we couldn’t exactly go to the hospital for help.” He seems at a loss for words.

Pride swells in Kori’s chest. Smiling down at her kids, Kori says, “That’s great, Gar.” After a moment, she spots the car and feels just a bit lighter. “He’s going to be okay. We’ll just stitch him up and he’ll be just fine, and then we can give him hell for making us worry.”

Grateful for the lack of people at this hour and seemingly incompetent police, Kori nearly runs the last few feet to the car. They’d slipped past the dwindling officers to get back to the ruins of the building after regrouping and due to the explosion, the streets had been cleared in terror. She almost feels bad for the residents of the area because of the lack of competent law enforcement but it isn’t _her_ town so it isn’t her problem.

Instead, she focuses on lowering Dick down as gently as physically possible into the backseats. His head rests on Gar’s lap who seems to not realize his fingers are tentatively carding through Dick’s hair. Rachel sits in the front though her eyes are glued to the rearview mirror when she isn’t craning her neck around for a quick glance at Dick and Gar. 

Kori steps on the pedal and probably breaks a few traffic laws but, again, the police must be made up of dumbasses or assholes, probably both, because they aren’t stopped at all. She drives until they’re in the next town and would keep going until they have an entire town between them and the remains of the building just to be sure but she knows Dick can’t last long in the cramped back seats. He needs medical attention, even if it is from a teenager with minimal experience.

Finding the first sleazy motel is easy given that they’re at the edge of town. She pulls into the parking lot less than gracefully and slides out of the seat as soon as the keys are in her hands. She tells Gar to hang in tight and leaves Rachel to look over them while she pulls a wad of cash out of the glove compartment and throws it down on the desk. They just need a couple of nights, maybe three if Dick is too weak to travel. The bored woman with a face full of piercings hands her the room card.

Kori turns on her heel and returns to the car to scoop Dick out of the backseat with Gar’s help. With the same amount of urgency as before, Kori carries Dick into the room. She passes Rachel the room key, frowning deeply at how cold Dick feels.

“We need towels, hot water, and a first aid kit,” Kori says. Leaning down, she deposits Dick on the bed and shoves the rest of the cash in her pocket. “I’ll get some blankets, too, because I don’t trust these sheets. After we patch him up, I’ll grab some food and anything else you guys need, alright?”

The kids nod, looking pale and drawn in the shitty motel lighting. Kori holds back a sigh at how unfair it is that these two kids would get stuck with such crappy lives. She doesn’t like dwelling on this type of thought, so she presses a kiss to each of their heads and makes her way to the door. “Don’t let anyone in,” she throws over her shoulder.

* * *

Gar and Rachel are sitting on the bed with Dick, having propped him up with a couple of pillows when Kori comes back. They’re quiet, just staring down at their hands, sending a pang of something dark into Kori’s chest. She brushes it off quickly. There’s no time for wallowing in regret or sorrow or whatever it is. Dick needs them.

“I got the biggest first aid kit, Gar, so there should be everything you need in here.” Kori sets the kit down at the foot of the bed. Opening it brings a flood of relief. Inside there are suturing threads and needles, antibiotic ointment, gauze, and pain relievers, to name a few items. There’s also a pamphlet that probably has a lot of information they need, so Kori starts flipping through it. 

In a handful of minutes, they’re all ready to start. First, they clean Dick’s wounds. They retract the pillows and roll him gently to his relatively uninjured side. His right shoulder and thigh were the worst off with deep lacerations on both and his ribs are probably bruised or cracked. He’s covered in smaller cuts and deep bruises that need to be iced. Once they’ve cleaned the dried blood, Gar can clearly see where to stitch, so they disinfect the wounds and let him get to work.

His hands don’t shake. It only takes him around fifteen minutes to suture both wounds. The worst of it is over, though, so the rest of the process isn’t so petrifying. Gar disposes of his bloody gloves and replaces them with a fresh pair. The three of them don’t have to say much while cleaning the rest of the smaller cuts. Afterward, Kori sits down heavily on the unoccupied bed. She watches Rachel drape two thick blankets over Dick, who hasn’t woken up once. 

“Could we get some fried chicken?” Gar’s question breaks the silence.

Kori breathes out a laugh. “Of course. Do you need anything else?” He shakes his head and looks over at Rachel.

“No,” she says, “But could we just get it delivered here? I don’t…I don’t want you to leave.”

The feeling is reciprocated. Kori doesn’t want to leave them either. She nods and makes quick work of a large order. With that out of the way, Kori tells them to get ready for bed. Rachel dashes into the bathroom to take a quick shower. While they wait, Kori wraps Gar in a tight hug.

“You did great, Gar.” 

He doesn’t anything, just hugs her back and then sits right back down next to Dick. The rest of the night passes by in a blur. Gar showers, the food arrives, Kori showers, and then once everyone – including Dick – is in their pajamas, the three of them devour their meals. Just as Kori is pulling the blankets back to make room for the three of them, Dick’s eyes start to flutter.

She calls his name. He seems disoriented when his eyes finally slide open. “Dick?” His gaze wanders over to her, glazed over and clearly not all here. It doesn’t matter to her or to Gar and Rachel; the fact that he’s awake is enough on its own. “Hey, hey, you’re okay. How are you feeling?” She hopes he’s coherent enough to answer just one question at least.

“ _Hhhh_ …” Apparently not. “Kids…wh- _hn-_ where? Gotta be safe. Kor’…” Whatever words he can force out between groans and whimpers are slurred heavily. Despite this, she can just barely put together his question. She knows what he’s asking and it makes her heart clench yet again.

The bastard can’t look after himself even once. “Gar and Rach are right here, Dick. They’re okay, too.” As she speaks, the two of them crawl into bed and press themselves to Dick’s side, careful not to jostle him or brush against his wounds. She lets herself slide under the covers beside Rachel. Leaning on one arm, she rests her other hand on Rachel’s where it holds onto Dick’s hand.

"It was s-so dark. Couldn’t breathe.” Dick’s hand twitches as if trying to grip Rachel’s hand tighter. 

“It’s okay now,” Rachel says, a childlike simplicity in her tone. It’s not surprising to see Rachel comforting Dick – she’s mature enough for this role reversal to make sense. 

Gar, holding onto Dick’s other hand, continues, “Yeah. Don’t worry, we won’t let you out of our sight.”

Smiling softly, Kori lies down without moving her hand. “We’re right here.”

Their voices and presence have calmed him down significantly. Dick’s breathing slows. His eyes are half-lidded and no longer hold a manic gleam of fear. A quiet murmur passes through his lips. It sounds a bit like _thank you_.


End file.
